When Edward Joseph Walker created the perfect toffee recipe back in the 1890s, little did he realise what he’d started.

From humble beginnings in a tiny Longton shop, Walker’s Nonsuch is now known as one of Britain’s oldest makers of traditional toffee and has become a firm favourite with people all around the world.

Today the family-run company, which is in its fifth generation, employs 70 people at its factory in Calverley Street and makes more than 1.25 million toffees a day – which are shipped to 45 different countries.

For more than 100 years, Walker’s Nonsuch has stayed true to the quality of its product, using only the best ingredients – an ethos which the Walker family believe is the key to the company’s continued success.

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UK sales director Katie Walker – who is the great-grandaughter of company founder Edward Joseph – said: “The success of the business is down to the product. We only use best quality products and we only manufacture our own brand. But in more recent years, it was my dad Ian’s determination and passion for toffee which made it all work.”

Katie’s sister Emma Walker, who looks after export sales and product design at the business, said: “It is quite unusual to have a toffee company in the heart of the Potteries, but the Walker family have always been from Stoke-on-Trent so it was a natural thing for us to set up in Longton.”

She added: “We are all passionate about our own jobs. When it is your own business, you work harder than you would in a normal job because you’re doing it for yourselves and you have a responsibility to the staff who work here.”

Until last year, Katie and Emma’s 81-year-old father Ian Walker – Edward Joseph Walker’s grandson – had been running the business, clocking up around 60 years of service.

But following Ian’s death in December 2017, Adrian Hill, who has worked at the company for 34 years, was appointed as managing director.

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Adrian, who joined the company in 1984, said: “As a non-family member, when I first came into the business I thought it would be like other family firms where the children come in, do half-an-hour and then go off in their sports car and play golf or squash or whatever they want to do. But this company was run completely differently.

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“The family had all got to earn their corn. There was no doubt about that. As far as Ian was concerned, they all had to prove their worth, there was no favouritism whatsoever. They all had to earn their right to be here.”

Adrian added: “I learned such a lot from Ian. He has left a massive hole and a big pair of shoes to fill.”